Also 6–7 swath. [late OE. swaþian, f. swaþ: see SWATHE sb.2]
1. trans. To envelop in a swathe or swathes; to wrap up, swaddle, bandage.
11[?]. MS. Cott. Vesp. D. 14, in Kluge, Angelsächs. Lesebuch, 73. Heo hine baðede … and frefrede and swaðede and roccode.
13[?]. Bonaventura’s Medit., 974. Marye, with a swote cloute, Swaþed here sones hede alle aboute.
c. 1425. Cursor M., 11236 (Laud). Suche clothis as she had to hond With suche she swathid [Cott. suedeld, Gött. swetheled] hym & bond.
c. 1440. Pallad. on Husb., IV. 78. Swathe [v.r. swethe] a tender vyne in bondes softe.
1538. Elyot, Fascior..., to swathe a chylde.
1611. Cotgr., Bander … to bind, swaddle, swath, tye with bands.
1697. Dampier, Voy., I. xv. 408. From their Infancy their Feet are kept swathed up with bands.
1742. Richardson, Pamela, IV. 319. I have seen poor Babies roll’d and swath’d, ten or a dozen times round, then Blanket upon Blanket, Mantle upon that.
1819. Scott, Ivanhoe, xlii. I found my arms swathed down, my feet tied. Ibid. (1824), Redgauntlet, let. xi. His legs stretched out before him, and swathed up with flannel.
1863. Tyndall, Heat, i. 6. Two glasses are swathed thickly round with listing, to prevent the warmth of the hands from reaching the mercury.
1892. K. Tynan, in Speaker, 3 Sept., 290/1. In the winter [the roses] were swathed in cocoanut fibre and sacking.
b. Said of the swathe or wrapping.
1856. Miss Mulock, J. Halifax, xxii. The showiest of cambric kerchiefs swathing him up to the very chin.
1909. Daily Graphic, 4 Oct., 13/2. This scarf-like trimming also swathes the high toques of pleated velvet.
c. To wrap round something, as or like a swathe or bandage.
1656. J. Smith, Pract. Physick, 163. The second band laid on they swathe with fewer rollings.
1824. W. Irving, T. Trav., IV. 279. He … had a red belt or sash swathed round his body.
1833. M. Scott, Tom Cringle, xv. (1859), 369. I can swathe a bandage too, although no surgeon.
1909. Daily Graphic, 4 Oct., 13/1. [To] wear their hair swathed round their heads à la Récamier.
2. transf. and fig. To envelop or surround as with a wrapping; to enwrap, enfold; † to encircle so as to confine or restrain.
1624. Quarles, Job, Sect. xviii. N 4 b. Who is’t that tames the raging of the Seas, And swathes them vp in mists, when-e’re he please?
1692. Bp. Hopkins, Disc. Providence, in Expos. Lord’s Prayer, etc., 276. Who hath swathed in the great and proud Ocean, with a Girdle of Sand.
1781. Cowper, Retirem., 527. [God] swathes about the swelling of the deep, That shines and rests, as infants smile and sleep.
1809. De Quincey, in ‘H. A. Page,’ Life (1877), I. vii. 145. My cottage … being swathed about by a little orchard.
1860. Froude, Hist. Eng., xxxv. VI. 528. in that brief time she had swathed her name in the horrid epithet which will cling to it for ever.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., I. xxi. 145. The Riffelberg was swathed in a dense fog.
1860. Farrar, Orig. Lang., vi. 141. The mists that swathed the primeval chaos.
1866. G. Macdonald, Ann. Q. Neighb., xv. (1878), 308. The water swathed their stems with coolness and freshness.
1884. W. C. Smith, Kildrostan, 43. Dim-lettered texts from the Holy Word; But all in the damp moss swathed and bound.
¶ 3. To make into sheaves. Obs. rare–0.
1611. Cotgr., Iavelé, swathed, or made into sheaues. Ibid., Iaveler, to swathe, or gauel corn; to make it into sheaues, or gauells.
